FireEye names malware's favorite targets, sources

Malware activity has become so pervasive globally that attack servers communicating with Malware are now hosted in 206 countries and territories.

That’s according to the latest FireEye Advanced Threat Report, which details malicious activities captured by the FireEye Security Platform through 2013.

The report draws on data gathered from nearly 40,000 unique cyberattacks (more than 100 per day) and over 22 million malware command and control (CnC) communications.

It provides a global picture of cyberattacks that routinely bypass traditional defenses such as firewalls, next-generation firewalls, IPS, antivirus, and security gateways.

It found businessess are attacked on average once every 1.5 seconds, compared to 2012, when malware attacks occurred once every three seconds. The increased frequency of use highlights the bigger role malware is playing in cyberattacks.

Malware attack servers, command and control (CnC) infrastructure are now in 206 countries and territories, up from 184 in 2012.

The U.S., Germany, South Korea, China, Netherlands, United Kingdom, and Russia were home to the most CnC servers.

Prime targets named

The top ten countries that were most frequently targeted by APTs in 2013 in order of highest to lowest frequency were the U.S., South Korea, Canada, Japan, United Kingdom, Germany, Switzerland, Taiwan, Saudi Arabia, and Israel.